Electric current collecting system

ABSTRACT

Electric current distribution and collecting system comprising contact shoes resiliently urged towards feed rails extending along a path of a vehicle moving at a high speed. The contact shoes are supported and guided by guide fingers which slidably engage recesses or holes provided in the shoes.

1451 Sept. 18,1973

Unite States Patent 11 1 Charamei 1 ELECTRIC CURRENT COLLECTING SYSTEM [75] Inventor: Pierre Charamel, Les Cotes De 2,411,797 11/1946 Lewis et FOREIGN PATENTS OR APPLICATIONS Sassenage, France Primary Examiner-Gera1d M. Forlenza Jan. 11, 1971 Assistant Examiner-George H. Libman Attorney-Stevens, Davis, Miller & Mosher Appl. No.: 105,301

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References Cited UNITED STATES PATENTS 2 Claims, 5 Drawing Figures mygy-sa 36 3 y- PATENTED sin 8 am SHEET 1 0F 2 L M38 36 32 a r Fig.2-

PATENTED EN 8 Im 3.750.128

SHEET 2 [1F 2 ELECTRIC CURRENT COLLECTING SYSTEM The invention relates to an electric current distribution and collecting system used to supply electric cur rent to vehicles moving at high speed such as air cushion supported vehicles driven by a linear electrical motor.

French Pat. No. 1,566,377 discloses a collecting system of the above mentioned type wherein contact shoes or brushes supported by a collector head are resiliently urged into sliding contact engagement with feed conductor rails which extend along the track of the vehicle. The collector head is guided in its traveling along the collecting track formed by the conductor rails by the brushes which have their lower ends slidably engaged in appropriate casings to move freely to wards or away from the associated rail. The brushes fit exactly with little clearance in their casings and deposits of foreign matter or of powder resulting from wear of the brushes may prevent free movement of the brushes and thus electrical and mechanical contact between the brushes and the rails.

It is an object of the present invention to provide guide means permitting free movement of the contact shoes or brushes with one degree of freedom.

Another object of the invention is the provision of a simple collector head which is easily fabricated.

These and other objects will become apparent upon reading of the following description given with reference to the accompanying drawings in which:

FIG. 1 is a fragmentary schematic sectional view of 30 a collecting systemembodying the present invention;

FIG. 2 is a sectional view taken on line II--II of FIG.

FIG. 3 is a sectional view taken on line III-III of FIG. 1 on which the feed conductor is schematically shown;

FIG. 4 is a schematic side view of a collector head according to the invention a modified form of guide fingers being shown;

FIG. 5 is a sectional view similar to FIG. 1, taken on line V-V of FIG. 4, the conductor rail being not shown.

Referring more particularly to FIG. 4 an electric multi-phase current feed track is formed of three conductor rails 10, 10' and 10" arranged in a triangle and extending parallel to the path of a vehicle (not shown) for instance propelled by an electric linear motor which is fed by the rails 10, 10', and 10". The speed of displacement of the vehicle may be several hundreds of miles per hour and it may be of the fluid-cushion supported type. A prismatic collector head 12 can slide within the passageway defined by the conductors 10, 10' and 10" and is guided in its displacement solely by the rails 10, 10' and 10" via current collecting contact shoes or brushes l6, l6 and 16', each resiliently biased respectively towards the rails l0, l0 and 10" by springs 20, 20 and 20". Such a current collecting arrangement is already described in above mentioned French patent.

A plurality of contact shoes 14, 16, 18 are longitudinally staggered along each rail and secured to the collector head to move freely in a transverse direction towards and away from the contact face of this rail. The contact shoes 14, 16, 18 are all of identical conformation and only one of them will now be described.

Referring to FIG. 5 the collector head 12 comprises a pair of guide fingers or rods 44, 46 protruding parallely in the direction of the rail. The guide fingers 44,46 may be cylindrical stainless steel rods secured to the collector head by screwing one of their extremities into the body of the collector head 12, the other extremity penetrating respectively into recessed blind or dead holes 40, 42 provided into the contact shoe 16. Compression coil springs 20 coaxial to each finger 44, 46 are inserted between the collector head 12 and the contact shoe to bias the latter into engagement with the rail 10. The cross section and depth of holes 40, 42 permit free movement in one directionof the slidably engaged shoe l6 and a rod 32 with a stop member or head 36 limits this movement to prevent falling out of the shoe 16 from the guide fingers 44, 46 after excessive wear of the shoes by virtue of the springs. The contact shoes 14, 16, 18 may be copper or copper graphite alloy brushes.

In a different arrangement shown in FIGS. 1 to 3 guide fingers or rods 24, 26 are secured to the collector head 12 by nuts 28, 30 in a longitudinally spaced apart position. The faces of shoe 16 which run parallel to the rail are called the major faces while the end faces are called the minor faces. The space between two successive fingers 24, 26 corresponds substantially to the length of the contact shoe 16 to engage the opposed front and rear minor end faces of the parallelepiped shaped shoe block 16. The guide fingers 24, 26 are cylindrical rods and the end faces of shoe 16 are made concave to slidably engage the overlapping finger extremities. The V or dihedral shaped front and rear end faces of shoe 16 enable accurate guiding with a single degree of freedom of contact shoel6 by the guide fingers 24, 26.-Each dihedral face of shoe 16 engages tangentially the associated cylindrical finger extremity along a line and this limited contact prevents locking of brush 16 by accumulated foreign matter. The front end face and the rear end face respectively of adjacent brushes l4, 16 may slidably engage a same guide finger 24 inserted between these faces. The cross section of fingers 24, 26 is preferably lower than the brush width.

Thus as in the arrangement shown in FIG. 5 a rod 32 passing through an opening 34 and provided with a stop member 36 may prevent falling out of the brushes and a spring 20 may be, for instance, located on rod 32 to act on face 22 of brush 16. Electrical lead out connections, schematically and partially shown in FIG. 1, may be associated with each brush. An abutment 38 provided on collector head 12 may limit displacement of rod 32 and brush 16 towards the collector head 12 to avoid protruding of the guide finger extremities from the contact faces of the brushes.

What is claimed is I. An electrical distribution and current collecting system of the type having a contact rail and a contact shoe assembly adapted for relative movement along said rail, said contact shoe assembly comprising a frame member, a movable contact shoe shaped for electrical sliding contact engagement with said rail, contact pressure means to resiliently bias said contact shoe against said rail, a pair of parallel, generally cylindrically shaped guide fingers extending from said frame member perpendicularly to said rail, said contact shoe having a pair of opposite major end faces extending parallelly to said rail and a pair of opposite minor end faces extending transversely of said rail, each minor end face including a dihedral portion guiding said contact shoe along said guide fingers.

2. An electrical distribution and current collecting system of the type having a contact rail and a contact fingers extending between said contact shoes, respectively, perpendicularly to said rail, said contact shoes having confronting end faces shaped for tangential sliding engagement with said guide fingers to guide said contact shoes towards and away from said rail.

* III 

1. An electrical distribution and current collecting system of the type having a contact rail and a contact shoe assembly adapted for relative movement along said rail, said contact shoe assembly comprising a frame member, a movable contact shoe shaped for electrical sliding contact engagement with said rail, contact pressure means to resiliently bias said contact shoe against said rail, a pair of parallel, generally cylindrically shaped guide fingers extending from said frame member perpendicularly to said rail, said contact shoe having a pair of opposite major end faces extending parallelly to said rail and a pair of opposite minor end faces extending transversely of said rail, each minor end face including a dihedral portion guiding said contact shoe along said guide fingers.
 2. An electrical distribution and current collecting system of the type having a contact rail and a contact shoe assembly adapted for relative movement along said rail, said contact shoe assembly comprising a frame member, a plurality of movable contact shoes spaceD apart in the direction of said rail and shaped for electrical sliding contact engagement therewith, contact pressure means to resiliently bias said contact shoes against said rail, and a plurality of parallel guide fingers extending between said contact shoes, respectively, perpendicularly to said rail, said contact shoes having confronting end faces shaped for tangential sliding engagement with said guide fingers to guide said contact shoes towards and away from said rail. 